


A Kiss For Comfort

by orphan_account



Series: One-Shot Wonderfest [4]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-06
Updated: 2013-08-06
Packaged: 2017-12-22 14:47:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 985
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/914462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's been years since Marco and Jean were growing up next door to each other. Years since a scrape or cut could be healed with only a kiss, and they lived safely within the walls. Now those times are nothing but memories, things that Jean must bear alone.</p><p>(Not really Jean/Marco, but I guess it can be if you want)</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Kiss For Comfort

Ever since I can remember, Marco has been there. Our mothers used to put us in the same crib, then chat over tea. We learned to sit up together, walk together, and run together. Marco's mother brought him over to play every day, and when we were old enough to play by ourselves, Marco kept it up, waiting every morning at the gate in front of my house. I'd finish my breakfast, do my chores, and race outside to play soldiers or chase. On rainy days, we stayed inside, reading books together underneath blankets, a stash of cookies or some other snack close at hand.

We were probably around the age of two when it started, that age that is synonymous with innocence, when a mother's kiss can heal any wound. I'm not sure who started it--probably Marco. I remember it clearly, as if it were yesterday. One of us would fall and scrape a knee, or we'd be flipping a page in a picture book and get a papercut, and start crying. We cried so easily in those days. Then the other would kiss the wound, gently, and that was all we needed to feel better and stop the tears. We thought nothing of it; our mothers could kiss us better, so why wouldn't it work if a brother did? Because Marco was my brother, if not in blood, then in bond.

When I was three, my parents started fighting. I was so scared, hearing them shouting at each other. The first time it happened, I escaped to the backyard, crying quietly. I leaned my back against the white picket fence that was all that separated Marco's house from mine. 

I barely heard a door open and close, but I did hear the light footsteps on the grass. I remember turning around and seeing Marco on the other side of the fence. 

"Are you okay?" he asked. I couldn't speak; I just shook my head. 

Without hesitating, Marco climbed over the fence and sat down next to me. He leaned over and kissed me on the cheek. "All better?"

And it was. At three, we still believed that a kiss could heal any wound, even emotional ones. After that, it became a habit, a sort of ritual. Whenever either of us was sad, the other would kiss it better. Our mothers thought this was so cute. Eventually, my parents made up. They still fought a lot, though, and whenever they did, I'd go back outside, and Marco would eventually join me.

We kept it up for years, until we got to an age when it became awkward for boys to kiss each other. We didn't want people getting the wrong idea about us--especially not girls. But after so many years of non-verbal comfort, it was hard to talk about the things that hurt us. So we stopped trying. 

We still did almost everything together: school, sports, enrolling in the military. We never seriously considered the possibility that something might happen to us until our first run-in with the titans. Once we were safe, Marco started talking non-stop about how I'd kept him alive. It was something of a surprise, all this emotion coming out. I think he'd been so frightened, it was a relief to be able to talk. Still, it made me uneasy.

When we found Marco's body, I felt sick. It was all I could do to talk to the woman with the clipboard; when she left, I ran to an alleyway and threw up, wishing I hadn't seen Marco like that. I kept thinking,  _We were so close._ I'd seen him shortly after Eren blocked the gap in the wall; Marco must have died in the aftermath, one of the last casualties of the battle. 

The night we burned the bodies felt like something out of a nightmare. The sickening stench of burning flesh choked me; the shards of bone taunted me, a grim reminder of what we had lost. I went back to the barracks and vomited again. 

Before I went to bed, I picked up a photo Marco and I had kept on the small table between our beds: Marco and I, just before we entered military school, arms around each other's necks, smiling. Happy. Unbidden, the memory of Marco as I had last seen him surfaced. Wounded, broken, hurt. How much pain had he endured before dying? 

I checked to make sure the curtains covered the windows before kissing the picture of Marco. One last kiss, for comfort. I couldn't heal the wounds that had killed Marco; this was all I could give him.

///////

It's so strange, living each day without Marco. Waking up and not seeing him smiling, already awake, ready to greet the day. Eating breakfast without him sitting next to me. I keep thinking of jokes to tell him, but when I turn around, there's no one there. I feel like a part of me is missing.

Every night, I look at my hands and wonder why I'm still alive. Marco and I were inseparable our whole lives; now, we're separated in a way that can never be undone. Why him? What am I supposed to do without my brother? How long will I outlive him? I don't want to die, even if it meant seeing Marco again. I'm still to self-centered to die. I don't want to end up like Marco, just another body to be disposed of. And I can't die, because then who would remember Marco? 

And every night, I kiss the picture of Marco. I know it's useless; death is not something you can kiss better. But I'm not doing it for Marco anymore. I'm doing it for me, because I'm the one who's hurting. And if Marco can't be here to comfort me, then pretending I can comfort him is the next best thing.

It's all I've got.


End file.
